The founder of outspoken Scottish craft brewery BrewDog
says its new "transgender" beer is not a gimmick and is a genuine
effort to help the LBGT community.

But the beer has provoked some backlash in the LBGT community. A
spokesperson for charity Stonewall
told the Independent it was "concerned about the language" in
the campaign, saying it could "undermine" the community.

Some people have also taken to Twitter to criticise BrewDog's
apparent use of transgender identity as a marketing ploy.

.@brewdog trans people have to work so hard already to have our identities respected--to slap our identity onto your product is insulting

The launch of the beer coincides with the opening of
BrewDog's new bar in Soho, London. The area was once the city's
red light district but is now a more mainstream nightlife
hotspot. BrewDog said in a statement that the new beer is
"designed to reflect the diversity of the area and champion
inclusivity."

BrewDog
founders James Watt, left, and Martin Dickie.BrewDog

James Watt, the founder and CEO of BrewDog, told Business Insider
that the beer was not a gimmick or marketing ploy and is a
genuine attempt to help the LGBTQI+ community.

Watt told BI: "People have got to look at what we've
done here. We've worked with the charity Queerest of the Queer to
put this together. They co-designed the packaging, they worked
with us on the project, we're donating all the proceeds of sales
of this beer to charity."

Watt says the beer wasn't a response to the recent criticism of
BrewDog's recent video, saying: "It was already in the works."

He says: "We've got a history of doing beers that help things we
feel passionate about and that help minority groups such as Hello
My Name is Vladimir. People need to look at this in the context.
We have worked with a charity to put this project together."

Watt says of No Label: "It was a project we wanted to execute and
it was important to do this one with someone who was active in
that community and it was also important to give the profits of
the beer to the community.

"I think it was also important to make a beer that tastes
fantastic but also messed about with unusual hops that have gone
through this kind of gender change and in a style which is a
Kolsch, which is somewhere in between an ale and a lager. The
whole thing just blurs the boundaries of identity."